1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to the branching connection box in which plural wires that constitute a wire harness, for instance, for automobiles are branched and connected with use of vertically-connective and horizontally-connective press-contact terminals.
2. Related Art
Individual units of the automotive electric equipment are connected with the wire harnesses where a plurality of electric wires are bundled. For the simplification of the wire harness structure or such purposes, the wire harnesses are intervened with branching connection boxes.
FIGS. 10 through 12 show this type of branching connection box that has been disclosed in JP-A-9-115572. As shown in FIGS. 10 and 11, a housing 1 of the branching connection box is composed of a rectangular insulative bottom plate 1a and a box-shaped insulative cover 1b that covers the insulative bottom plate 1a. On both lateral sidewalls of this housing 1, connectors 2 for connection to a plurality of external wires 9 are formed by extrusion as integral parts.
An insulative baseplate 3 is mounted on the insulative bottom plate 1a of the housing 1. On the insulative baseplate 3, wires 4 for connection between connectors 2 are wired parallel, and ends of the wires 4 are connected respectively to the prescribed connector 2. A branching connection part 8 is provided on the right-hand side of the insulative baseplate 3 in the fig. The other ends of the wires 4 are arranged in such manner as to oppose mutually at the branching connection part 8 with a predetermined distance apart.
As shown in FIG. 10 through FIG. 12, press-contact terminals 5 are attached to the other end parts of the wires 4 respectively. The press-contact terminals 5 are connected by press-contact and secured respectively to core wires. The core wires are exposed at the other end parts of the wires 4 and are not shown in the Figure. In addition, resin walls 3a preventing short circuits are provided on the insulative baseplate 3 and on both sides of each of the press-contact terminals 5.
Each pair of press-contact terminals 5 are connected with an aluminum wire 6 by the wire bonding method, based on a necessary wire connection pattern, and the aluminum wires 6 intersect three-dimensionally in the above-described branching connection part 8. This constitutes a branching circuit inside the housing 1 for branching of a plurality of external wirings 9. In addition, each of the aluminum wires 6 is molded with resin 7 in such manner that some space is left between the aluminum wires 6 on the branching connection part 8 to prevent short circuit.
A similar technology concerning this branching connection box is disclosed in JP-A-7-9022U or such.
However, in the above-described branching connection box, the connectors 2 for connection of the external wires 9 are provided respectively on both sides of the housing, and thus the size of the entire branching connection box has been enlarged by that much. Additionally, since the formation of the branching circuit requires the press-contact terminals 5, which are so disposed as to oppose the branching connection part 8 mutually, to be connected with the aluminum wires 6 and to be covered with the resin 7, the structure has become complicate and the costs have increased.
Therefore, the invention is purposed to solve the above-described problem through elimination of the connectors for connection to the main body of the connection box, and thus to provide a branching connection box that enables the structural simplification and the cost reduction.
According to the invention, the branching connection box of connecting a plurality of trunk wires on a trunk line side to a plurality of branch wires on a branch line side, the branching connection box includes:
a connection box main body;
at least one vertically-connective press-contact terminal including a pair of first press-contact parts on both vertical sides thereof, one of the first press-contact parts adapted to press-contacting an end of the associated trunk wire, the other first press-contact part adapted to press-contacting an end of the associated branch wire; and
at least one horizontally-connective press-contact terminal including a pair of second press-contact parts on both vertical sides thereof and a third press-contact part adapted to connect the second press-contact part to the second contact parts provided at the horizontally adjacent horizontally-connective press-contact terminal, one of the press-contact parts adapted to press-contact an end of the associated trunk wire, the other press-contact part adapted to press-contact an end of the associated branch wire,
wherein the at least one vertically-connected press-contact terminal and the at least one horizontally-connective press-contact terminal are arbitrarily combined and mounted on the connection box main body.
In this branching connection box, respective uses of arbitrary combinations of the vertically-connective press-contact terminals and the horizontally-connective press-contact terminals enable formation of desired branching circuits of simple structure at low costs, and elimination of the connectors for connections to the connection box main body also contributes to the entire size reduction.
According to the invention, at least one insulative wall is protruded from an approximate center of the connection box main body and disposed between two of the at least one vertically-connected press-contact terminal and the at least one horizontally-connective press-contact terminal.
This branching connection box enables connection of the ends of the wires on the trunk line side and the other ends of the wires on the branch line side to the press-contact parts on one side and the press-contact parts on the other side of the press-contact terminals of respective linkage connection types by an extremely simple operation of press-contacts, and the elimination of conventional resin molding as a separate operation enables the ensured and inexpensive prevention of a short circuit between the press-contact terminals of the respective linkage connection types with the insulative walls.